THE WATCHER

It was a dark and stormy series . . .

August 21, 2005|By Maureen Ryan.

"Six Feet Under," one of HBO's signature series, ends its five-season run at 8 p.m. Sunday.

Good riddance.

I know that sounds harsh, as many fans will be mourning the loss of this show, which was, after all, about loss. But the saga of the fractured Fisher family and their funeral home went on at least two years too long.

If you think I soured on the show because it was too dark, you're mostly wrong. It was dark, but in the first few seasons, there was levity and love and wisdom interspersed with the dark stuff. And there were more scenes with the Fisher kids' dead dad (Richard Jenkins), who I thought was a hoot.

What I objected to in the last two years was how predictably dark "Six Feet Under" was. Characters almost always made the wrong choices, dated the wrong people, married the wrong people, made mean comments and did self-destructive things. It's boring when you invariably know what's going to happen next, and when characters never, ever learn from experience.

Not only did the plots go in circles, "Six Feet Under" presented misery as normal. Almost every person on the show was trapped in an airless prison of depression and self-hatred. Whose life is that suffused with suffering -- every second of every day? It just defied reason and reality that all the Fishers and everyone they knew were so unhappy all the time. The "Six Feet" corpses, who occasionally chatted with the cast in fantasy sequences, often had more hopeful outlooks on life than the live people on the show, which is just weird.

The last four episodes of the show, including the 75-minute finale, have centered on the death of Nate Fisher (Peter Krause) and have contained some powerful, beautiful, impressive moments that reminded me once again why the "Six Feet" cast and writers have gotten an armload of Emmy nominations every year. But the biggest crime of the past few seasons has been that, much of the time, these extraordinary actors haven't gotten material worthy of their talents.

Rachel Griffith's character, Brenda Chenowith, in particular, became only more toxic and shrewish as time went on. And did we really need to see another incestuous story line between her and her on-screen brother? Even if the recent scene of her and her brother in bed was a dream -- ick! And we've been down that road several times before.

Griffith and Brenda, whose tortured journey toward redemption and self-respect was so gripping in the past, both deserved better. So did viewers.

See you later, "Six Feet Under." I hope you find peace in the afterlife.